Cloud gaming service OnLive is not a sustainable business because hardcore gamers won't put up with "the jitters or any kind of stuttering", and will revert back to consoles.
"We've looked at OnLive's [business] model and we don't believe it's sustainable," he told GI.biz. "We don't believe they can make money on it."
He went on, "We know what they're making from a distribution fee perspective, because that's their model... So EA says here's a game, and that game retails for $50. We know that they're only making x percent, and within that margin there's no way they can make money, given their operating expenditure, as well as the initial capital expenditure in order to get that data centre up and running."
While Gupta admits the end user experience is "pretty good", he casts doubts on the overall quality of gameplay versus a console.
"The problem, I feel, is that if I'm playing Call Of Duty and I know that on my PlayStation 3 it's an amazing, uninterrupted experience, the minute I get jitters with OnLive, or any kind of stuttering, that's it, I'm going to stop," he said. "These aren't the sort of games where you can have that level of delay or unpredictable performance."
He suggests that services offering large-scale AAA games haven't yet found a solution to latency problems. But Game Tree TV doesn't have this issue because it focuses on small games like Peggle and Plants vs. Zombies, which are downloaded to devices such as smart TVs and set-top boxes and played with the TV remote.
"Think of us as the Netflix of videogames-on-demand," he said. "We've got a sophisticated infrastructure located in the cloud... but the one big difference is that we download the content directly to the device, and that allows us to run the content optimally, and not have to worry about bandwidth issues and so on, which, in certain territories, can be a big problem."
Valve boss Gabe Newell "really likes" the games-on-demand service. At least, that's according to OnLive.
Comments
7 comments so far...
kimoak on 4 Jul '11 said:
I am not into this Onlive thing, but they have huge cahones. (I understand that it's spelt wrong
) Gotta respect their ambition at least.
solamon77 on 4 Jul '11 said:
I totally agree with this guy. I sometimes have trouble streaming movies consistently. How is that going to translate to a game that requires a response time of less than 100ms?
ianson on 5 Jul '11 said:
The big question is what new tech will it drive research and funding into? If we get a new big thing in tech then onLive is there with the infrastructure to move quickly. Take a look at industry and you find stories like that all the time. What looks like a dummy move, and requires uber-mega-grande cojones, pays off because it pushes industries in certain directions and tech turns up that turns the mickey mouse organisation into a global phenom . Cloud is here to stay and one day it will easily provide streaming of game content at speed and if onLive live that long they will get it up and running first and cash in first. I personally think they did it too early but, what do I know? I'm a gamer not an engineer/futures expert.
Barca Azul on 5 Jul '11 said:
Cojones
Don't tell MS though, as they think digital is the next big thing!'t tell MS though, as they think digital is the next big thing!
shogunreaper on 5 Jul '11 said:
How exactly does online work? Do they have a console for every single person who's playing a game?
jdkoke on 5 Jul '11 said:
Agreed. When i finally got the f**ker to work I did get stuttering and that was only playing a demo of Lego Harry Potter. To f**k wi playing any online game through it. I didn't install it at all on my new build
slader on 5 Jul '11 said:
They run virtualized PC games, you can get everything you want to know about OnLive
@OnLiveSpot